Tumon Bay

     In August of 1993 my family moved back to Guam.  Actually that is not totally true.  My daughter moved simultaneously to a job in Phuket, Thailand while we moved back to Guam after being there a few years prior.  The island had developed considerably since being there in 1990-91, our previous time there.
     A musical friend of mine, Jeff Patterson,    Jeff Patterson profile  had also decided to check out life on Guam and landed within a short time after our arriving.  He stayed with us in our apartment for a brief time. 
     Jeff and I hadn't written anything of consequence before this although we had worked together in creative musical groups since our days in high school and college.
     We sat down and started to write a melody, a three note bit that felt very soothing.  We wrote that on my new guitar which I had purchased use in my music classes at Tamuning Elementary School where I was the elementary music specialist.  That three note bit was the center point, but we had no words.  Nothing!  It was one of those blah-blah-blah songs......  We used the words "light like air" which felt nice.
     In my mind I felt we were writing a song on the lines of Air Supply or something.  It had that kind of felling to it. We had the whole song written melodically.  It was pretty good; even the harmonies were following into place.  But, it was still "blah, blah, blah" or "light like air" and that had to go.  So, we were driving in the car with Barb and Julian Janssen and Barb said, "how about 'Tu-mon Bay' that works" and it could be a piece for the most important tourist spot on Guam.
     Wow!  Inspiration!  All of a sudden the car was alive with the phrase "Tumon Bay".  But, that was just the chorus.  What about the verse?
     Jeff literally went swimming the next day in Tumon Bay and after sat down and the whole lyric flowed out of him.  In this situation the place, Tumon Bay, actually inspired via its natural beauty.

     So, it came back to us together to finalize the lyric.  We already had ideas of its use.  We were going to present the song to the Guam Visitors Bureau for use as a bit for their advertising.  We recorded it on a cassette and with lyrics accompanying it I presented it to GVB.  They took forever to get back to me and when they did their response was, "it's about Tumon Bay, not Guam"  That was true, of course.  It zeroed in on one locale and not the entire island.  But, we still had a great song.
     Jeff left Guam shortly to return to the Pacific Northwest.  So, the song sat unused.
     For me, 1996 found me recording a children's CD called "Hafa Adai!  Fun Songs From Guam And Around The World".  I needed some more material and "Tumon Bay" seemed ripe for use.  So, I recorded it       overdubbing my voice three times for the background harmonies.  The harmony that I sang (two part) in the second verse was what Jeff would have sung if he had been available; but he was in the states.
     That song got a bit of help from my friend Tom Renfro who was a DJ at the time on Guam's public radio station.  It got a good response and I appreciated his help in publicizing it.
     I was now working at St. John's School in Guam in 1997.  Another school had just recorded an album for Christmas and gained a lot of acclaim for it.  The administration and other teachers saw my skills in songwriting and suggested that our school should put out a CD of some sort also.  I went back to the studio that had recorded my CD and when they heard that I was representing St. John's School the price went up.  The school was seen as wealthy and should be able to put up the money.
     No was the answer to that.  I came back from the studio with an inflated price and was given a definite NO.  So, now what?
     My friend Chris Evola, who was a supporter of my work suggested getting a digital recorder and do it ourselves.  Of course he was saying "you Dave".  I had never recorded anything on my own totally, except demos for sending to publishers.  This would be a new undertaking and honestly I was afraid of my own "get it done quickly" style of doing things which left quality somewhere in the backseat.
     But, he convinced me and I in turn convinced the school of the low price and what my goal would be, to create a CD for the school.
     I thought of Jeff and my song, Tumon Bay, as the piece to work with.  So, I created a backing track slower and more sultry than the previous recording.  I also created a "waves hitting the shore" sound for an introduction to the song.
     I started working with my 4th, 5th, 6th grade choir to sing the harmonies behind what would be the lead singer.  The background voices were recorded around one microphone in a classroom.  I didn't have enough headsets so  some of the children were the primary singers and the rest heard their singing and sang to the timing of their singing.  In retrospect I have to say I can't believe we were actually able to come up with anything worthwhile, but it was wonderful.
     I had selected Natasha Melwani, who had a very nice smooth melodic voice, as my lead singer. Her mother would drop her off at the school and we would record her part verse by verse.  There were many takes and I would have to judge each one on its quality and ask her back a few times.  You must remember that the song is 5 minutes long and each verse had to be as perfect as it could be.  The work was gruelling for a sixth grader to deal with, but she was a trooper and the final product was wonderful.
     Guam is a destination resort to the Asian area.  Millions of people, especially from Japan, visit Guam each year.  As much as songs about Guam might attract English speaking listeners the truth is that more Asian languaged persons visit Guam, so if a song could be in their own language, that could be a very good thing.
     I saw this opportunity and went to work on it.  I first presented the lyric to one of the Japanese language teachers at St. John's, Ichie Shepherd, and asked her to translate the song for me.  She did that, but the result was not lyrical enough.  That can be a problem in dealing with translation of lyrics.
     With this new thought, translating to Japanese, I needed a new singer who was fluent in Japanese.  There was a new girl to St. John's, Sanae Okada who had just recently moved from Japan to Guam.  Her mother, by chance, was quite talented at music and she took it upon herself to make a more poetic Japanese Tumon Bay lyric.  What you hear on the recording is a synthesis of Jeff's lyric and Mrs. Okada's poetic work.

     The music of the Japanese Tumon Bay was taken by my friend Chris Evola who was a teacher of physics at St. John's School.  He worked for a year or longer at creating a music video using images of Tumon Bay and of course the singer, Sanae Okada.  In the video are students of St. John's, and curious and I feel innovative use of color, and the natural beauty that is Tumon Bay.

Tumon Bay as performed by Dave Janssen

Leaving Guam for Suzhou, China

What is it that makes people do extreme things?  Sometimes life gives us few options.  We work as hard as we can to stay in the status quo.  The status quo is safe.  We know it....it's happened before and we can have it go on and on.

But, God doesn't always allow us to keep doing the things we want.  Sometimes we try and try and try to fix problems but it just can't be fixed.  If that occurs then maybe it's time to walk away and start something new. 

You've reached the top in your particular job and still what was good in the past is somehow not accepted by those who are around you.  You can beat up on yourself and take it, or you can say, "that's enough" and start in a new direction.

That's what happened for me.  I worked at a school in Guam, thought of as the best on Guam, and perhaps it was, at one time.  But, people from the outside, who had no idea about the traditions of the school and further, did not respect those traditions came in and started chopping off heads.

I was NOT one of those who had their head chopped off.  I was a cooperative man who could adapt to new ways, if necessary.  But, the decline in the school had already been set in motion.  So, my friends disappeared in quick fashion.  Of 60 teachers, 26 disappeared, either forced out or sympathetic to their co-workers' plights.  The following year the school's student population fell and with it the income to the school.

By the end of the second year of this new administration the school was now  monetarily driving on fumes.   One day in the spring of the new administration's second year I accidentally found in the trash, next to the copy machine, notes that the headmaster would be using for the board meeting.  He had been given the job, by the board, of eliminating those teachers who had been found to be superfluous.

But, the layoffs did not happen.  This new administration's third school year began with all 60 teacher in place.  Within one month "financial austerity" was declared to the assembled teachers by the headmaster and immediately 7 teachers were laid off.  This was too much for me, especially since I had been privy to the memo from the springtime which stated that the headmaster must act.  But, he had waited until the school year began and then had laid these teachers off.  I felt this was beyond cruel to have taken someones signed contract and throw it away one month into the new school year.  For me this was writing on the wall.  I needed to find a job that would meet the same income standards that I'd had at this school, and do it NOW.

Most of my friends, who had left, but who had taught at this school had gone to international schools in the Asian area.  This seemed like the best possibility for me also.  I had been checking international school hiring websites for the past few months and had found a job opening at a school in Suzhou, China where a friend of mine had previously worked.  That's what I needed!  This would be a natural departure.  

So, it was time to prepare for going to China.....a lifelong interest of mine.
I had always been curious about China since I was a child.  My parents had a travel encyclopedia which I had pored over and China had been of special interest.  Asia was so much different from what I had seen growing up in Portland, Oregon.

Dave Janssen's Music Online
 "Hafa Adai" in the classroom, Spring 2010

My beginnings with Suzhou Singapore International School were from a listing that I'd seen for an elementary music specialist position which I'd seen listed in early September of 2010.  This was a lucky break for me because usually international schools advertised in December and January prior to the beginning of the school year.  So, this was an opportunity that I was lucky to have found.

As a part of being hired I had talked to the elementary principal, a director of PYP (a system of study in many international schools), an elementary music teacher already in place, and the head of the arts department.  The interview was done by telephone which surprised me.  I thought they might use Skype in a face to face conversation.  


24 hours later I received word that I had been successful in my interview and my move began in earnest.


I needed to pass all my important papers to the human resources department so that they could begin the process of my Chinese work visa.  This was one of the most important aspects of moving to China.  For me,  I had not been hired in the normal fashion so the school did not have adequate time to get my work visa, which usually takes a few months.  The principal wanted me there immediately so they were going to us other ways to start me out.


As it turned out the music teacher that I replaced had come to the school the first day of school, turned, and left without returning.  So, the second music teacher had been under a double work load for the past month and a half and wanted out of that circumstance as quickly as possible.


The solution for the school was to land me in Hong Kong, get a 30 day tourist visa, and then make my way to Suzhou in haste.  What this meant was that I would have to leave the country after 30 days of work at Suzhou, to return again to Hong Kong to obtain my work visa.  But, that will be written of in a future instalments, at length.